Adam Peaty & A 57.58 On The Clock; He’ll Race Breaststroke In Barcelona This Weekend

Back in the southern summer Down Under, the Miami Super Challenge featured efforts of 28.19 and 57.58 from Adam Peaty. Hold on: 57.58? That’s a world record, surely? Not on freestyle it’s not – but perhaps Peaty was practicising the pace he wants when two arms windmilling turn to two arms packing a simultaneous punch on the stroke he’s swum to pioneer status on these past two seasons. Don’t expect a 57 anything over 100m breaststroke this weekend (indeed, 58s would be something special) at the Club Sant Andreu pool in Barcelona as the Mare Nostrum Tour reaches its zenith with the best entry of the week, the Olympic squads of Britain, Germany and the bulk of such elite from many other nations gathered for a runes of Rio tune-up. A trawl down the entry list, the prospect of fine racing … and the battle behind the battle, doping

All SwimVortex articles are placed in our archive after five days, the library of content available to subscribers.Log InRegister

Comments

aswimfan
June 10, 2016

OK, I am calling it:
At 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Penny Oleksiak will be Canadian first ever female swimming gold medallist. And the first swimming gold medalist after Alex Baumann and Victor Davis did it in 1980.

Peaty on 57.58 100 free? Cate Campbell can give him 5 seconds handicap and still beat him 🙂

Craig Lord
June 10, 2016

Not the first, asf: Anne Ottenbrite – 1984 gold 200 breaststroke (& silver 100m)
Peaty has a 51-52 100 free best… for some reason, he was a bit slower that day 🙂

Oleksiak has certainly made a meteoric entry into international calculations in both 100free and fly this year but lets just see how her next couple of years pan out before we start engraving medals.

She may consolidate into a major international contender in one or both events; one event may progress ahead of the other; she may suffer “second season syndrome”. Lets just see what transpires and take it from there.

Peter Lee
June 11, 2016

Sarah will have something to say about that. I don’t think she’ll retire until Tokyo. Oleksiak is a strong potential medallist, but not nailed-on for gold. The Campbell sisters might also decide to go until 2020.

commonwombat
June 11, 2016

Peter, we’ll have to wait and see what happens post Rio. Sarah is still young enough for Tokyo to be a goer however, should she have a successful Rio, she may decide to get out whilst on top.

As for the Campbells, C1 is 24 and this will be her 3rd Olympics. She certainly could still go another full cycle but both sisters have tended to be somewhat fragile physically and she may not feel she’s up for another 4 years. I suspect that she will most likely make the “home” CG on the Gold Coast in 2018 her farewell.

C2 is 22 and Rio is only her 2nd Games so age probably won’t be the concern. Rather, like her sister, the issue is whether the body will be up for it.

aswimfan
June 11, 2016

Thanks CL and CW, yes I meant 1984 LA. And I forgot about Anne Ottenbrite.
Wow, Canadian swimming in 1984 certainly reached its zenith.

commonwombat
June 11, 2016

They certainly had some quality swimmers at that time but the Eastern Euro boycott certainly impacted the quality on the womens’s competition.

Matt Gibson
June 12, 2016

aswimfan don’t forget about Mark Tewksbury winning the 100 back at the 92 Olympics ahead of Jeff Rouse!

Membership has been expired

Dear Reader,

We hope that you have been well informed and entertained by our coverage of swimming at SwimVortex in the past year and trust that your experience has been fruitful. Your free membership of SwimVortex has expired. To continue to have access to our content and rankings please choose from the following membership levels. You can become a supporter of our work with a Bronze membership set at just €1. A small price to pay for independent and fearless journalism of the kind we provide and will continue to provide for as long as we have the support that enables us to do so.